Raphael is insane

[ATEM]

I'm quite surprised I always see people complaining about Nightmare but not Raphael. Well, to be fair I'm talking about people who main Raphael. Someone who knows this character is virtually untouchable, he's extremely quick. I main Xianghua who is also a quick character, but I have fought people who mains this character and nothing I tried to do to counter attack worked.

I know that every character is almost OP in the wrong hands, but if you ever encounter a high rank Raphael you might remember this topic; GI, RE, nothing works, all you see is a never ending light speed rampant chain of combos that surprisingly have an enormous reach.

I can give a good fight to a good Taki, but this character is insane, how do you defend against him?

[Gaxkang]

The typical wisdom given out has been if you sidestep to the left he's toast (when the game came out he was said to be terrible)..but eh, lately I've had Raph fights where I couldn't sidestep, I couldn't GI him, and I couldn't punish him on block. RE has only so much use.

[Discane]

He will be nerfed in a next patch.

Also, I think most of the characters are OP in some way except for Geralt, Mitsu, and Tira.
Half of the roster have combos, started with low, easy lethals, half HP natural combos, long juggles, throw into CA (hi, Xianghua). Usually, you just counter offense with your offense, that's life.

As Geralt I use a move which sidesteps and attack at the same time.

[ATEM]

Originally posted by Gaxkang:

The typical wisdom given out has been if you sidestep to the left he's toast (when the game came out he was said to be terrible)..but eh, lately I've had Raph fights where I couldn't sidestep, I couldn't GI him, and I couldn't punish him on block. RE has only so much use.

That's my point, I also tried side stepping, but he also has some attacks that negates this weakness. For instance, I can beat some D3+ players (I'm E3 atm), and a couple of hours ago I almost lost to a F3 Raphael, he is a very difficult character to predict. Maybe I just have to fight him a lot more I guess.

[Gaxkang]

Originally posted by ATEM:

That's my point, I also tried side stepping, but he also has some attacks that negates this weakness. For instance, I can beat some D3+ players (I'm E3 atm), and a couple of hours ago I almost lost to a F3 Raphael, he is a very difficult character to predict. Maybe I just have to fight him a lot more I guess.

There's tracking moves and even verticals that track which I suppose he has some of those. That might explain some of it. Some moves might require blocking one or two hits and then sidestepping, I think that worked on one thing I saw once.
Raph has speed, range, and he can do damage in various ways. So it stacks up quick.

Some issues can be related to just not knowing matchup stuff (I don't know a lot myself so heh). So the ol' be a Raphael player to beat a Raphael stuff.

But on the fly some stuff *should* get evident...when it doesn't it can feel pretty wack.

But there's a lot of cheese in the game. IMO Xinghua, whom you mention, has cheese herself...but Raphael may well have even more.
It's like, having to outcheese someone first before they do you.

[ATEM]

Originally posted by Discane:

He will be nerfed in a next patch.

Also, I think most of the characters are OP in some way except for Geralt, Mitsu, and Tira.
Half of the roster have combos, started with low, easy lethals, half HP natural combos, long juggles, throw into CA (hi, Xianghua). Usually, you just counter offense with your offense, that's life.

As Geralt I use a move which sidesteps and attack at the same time.

Had no idea he will get nerfed. I don't know why people say Mitsu sucks, I have fought some that knew what they were doing, he is highly predictable tho. As for Tira, yes, I have to agree, she sucks, you put like 4 times the amount of effort of your opponent to win, her speed and reach is a joke.

[ATEM]

Originally posted by Gaxkang:

Originally posted by ATEM:

That's my point, I also tried side stepping, but he also has some attacks that negates this weakness. For instance, I can beat some D3+ players (I'm E3 atm), and a couple of hours ago I almost lost to a F3 Raphael, he is a very difficult character to predict. Maybe I just have to fight him a lot more I guess.

There's tracking moves and even verticals that track which I suppose he has some of those. That might explain some of it. Some moves might require blocking one or two hits and then sidestepping, I think that worked on one thing I saw once.
Raph has speed, range, and he can do damage in various ways. So it stacks up quick.

Some issues can be related to just not knowing matchup stuff (I don't know a lot myself so heh). So the ol' be a Raphael player to beat a Raphael stuff.

But on the fly some stuff *should* get evident...when it doesn't it can feel pretty wack.

But there's a lot of cheese in the game. IMO Xinghua, whom you mention, has cheese herself...but Raphael may well have even more.
It's like, having to outcheese someone first before they do you.

Agreed, but to be fair a lot of characters have a lot cheese. Let's not forget Yoshimitsu and his endles fan-like attacks that put a lot of pressure to even get some distance.

I don't know how I feel about Xianghua, she's definitely a good character but she is not easy to play IMO. You put a lot of effort. For example, I always struggle when both my opponent and I are 1 hit away from death, so for Xianghua to get that last hit is a real struggle. Whereas when I play as Kilik or Seong Mina you have plenty of wonderful attacks that are very likely to hit at long range.

[Discane]

Exact quote

Raphael

Oosaka: raphael we wanted to make a character based on a concept vertical / fast. And we want to keep that.

Middle guy: Raphael is fast and has the range. But on certain Match-Up he was a little too strong. we realized that he really reduces the move list of some characters. And we want the Match-Ups between different characters remain interesting and that’s why we are working on Raphael.

This character on the patch 1.10 is already very good, so we will see on the patch 1.11 how it will be for other characters if they can fight against him.

Dude left: Yes as he has already good attacks it would be a pity for example to reduce his speed, it would be frustrating.

Middle guy: it's really hard to balance

[Gaxkang]

Originally posted by ATEM:

Agreed, but to be fair a lot of characters have a lot cheese. Let's not forget Yoshimitsu and his endles fan-like attacks that put a lot of pressure to even get some distance.

I don't know how I feel about Xianghua, she's definitely a good character but she is not easy to play IMO. You put a lot of effort. For example, I always struggle when both my opponent and I are 1 hit away from death, so for Xianghua to get that last hit is a real struggle. Whereas when I play as Kilik or Seong Mina you have plenty of wonderful attacks that are very likely to hit at long range.

Oh yeah Yoshi is cheesy for sure...lots of people play him and not because they really like him himself.

Xinghua's juggling gives people Tekken feels of helplessness but just fighting her up close it can feel like you can wonder when your turn comes and trying to see what move she will use next can feel like a guess, in my experience anyways heh.
But if a character can abuse range against her, that's a plus yeah.

But yeah, lots of characters got cheese.

[FighterZealot]

High level ralphs are a problem for sure. Whenever I fight a good ralph I have to pray that I can squeeze in a down+A after blocking one of his attacks and maybe that will throw off his momentum. It does seem like a lot of his verticals track as well. He's almost worst than 2B to me. I can't complain too much though because I do use nigtmare and give no fuc*s about feelings when I'm playing him.

GET GOOD OR GET LOSE.

[Dave]

I've always felt like trying to step his moves is near impossible, no matter how much I tried, the Raph player would just track my ass harder than a heat-seeking missile. It feels like you can only do that when you're out of his range.

[Clide]

Originally posted by Discane:

He will be nerfed in a next patch.

Also, I think most of the characters are OP in some way except for Geralt, Mitsu, and Tira.
Half of the roster have combos, started with low, easy lethals, half HP natural combos, long juggles, throw into CA (hi, Xianghua). Usually, you just counter offense with your offense, that's life.

As Geralt I use a move which sidesteps and attack at the same time.

Geralt has some dumb stuff too but he’s still looks as plain as mitsu. But yeah everyone in this game has some cheap stuff. Which i dont mind because this game is pretty cool

[AlphaASX]

all characters are op with the right player :(

[VonDodo]

Raph is all but strong tournaments results doesn t lie....
Always Siegfried, Ivy and now Groh becam another constant presence they keep buffing...

No trace of raph after first week (when framelists didn t exist) except a last place top 8.

This proves also Namco is clueless with balance.

Aside that no nerf will change your issue except reducing raph players (i can say i got tired of raph being nerfed to trash tier any chapter each time its higher than low tier...).

If you really care about learning the mixup you need to tell wich moves gives you problems.
At that time you will learn chances and risk/reward are always in your favour unless you play talim...

[AGA | prinnyuber]

To balance everything out! STOP WITH THE ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ TRACKING VERTICALS ALREADY. X.X

[VonDodo]

Originally posted by prinnyuber:

To balance everything out! STOP WITH THE ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ TRACKING VERTICALS ALREADY. X.X

Raphael is the LEAST tracking character in game... even horizontal have tracking issues...